ABSTRACT The Administrative Core is responsible for direction of all activities in this Program Project Grant. The following are the specific responsibilities of the Administrative Core: o Oversight of all activities and collaborations of the Program Project Grant o Convening monthly meetings of the Steering Committee o Convening regular Program Project Investigators meetings o Convening meetings of the External Advisory Committee and Internal Advisory Committee o Compiling and summarizing the results of all meetings and distributing the reports to Program Project investigators o Preparing annual Progress Reports to the National Cancer Institute o Arranging travel to meetings at the 3 program project sites o Processing reimbursement for all program project-related expenses o Assisting in communication among Program Project investigators and preparation of reports and manuscripts o Communication and discussions with the National Cancer Institute program director and related officials o Compliance with all university, NIH, and governmental regulations and requirements o Maintenance of fiscal and budgetary functions o Coordination of data quality assurance matters in conjunction with the Biostatistics Core o Coordination with the mass spectrometry laboratory of the Masonic Cancer Center Analytical Biochemistry Shared Resource The Steering Committee consists of the Principal Investigators and Co-Investigators of each Project and Core. The External and Internal Advisory Committees consist of distinguished scientists who are well known for their outstanding work in areas highly relevant to the goals of this program project grant. The Administrative Core will provide professional coordination and oversight to all activities of this Program Project grant to ensure smooth collaborative progress toward our research goals while maintaining a high level of communication among our investigators and advisors and the National Cancer Institute, ensuring compliance with all regulations, and working together with all relevant university facilities, departments, and institutes as required for the timely completion of our research. RELEVANCE. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in the U.S. and worldwide. Cigarette smoking causes approximately 90% of lung cancer mortality in the U.S. This program project grant uses state- of-the-art genetic, epigenetic, analytical chemistry, and biochemical techniques to investigate established ethnic differences in lung cancer susceptibility among smokers to uncover critical mechanistic pathways thus providing new insights for lung cancer prevention.